'Bizarre Foods' host turns to America

Jan. 20, 2012

Updated Aug. 21, 2013 1:17 p.m.

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Andrew Zimmern is the host of "Bizarre Foods America," a Travel Channel show that travels the United States to sample meals such as deep-fried snapping turtle and bitter bamboo soup to name but two of those that show up in the season premiere on Monday. PHOTO COURTESY OF TRAVEL CHANNEL

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Andrew Zimmern tries a spring roll at the Hmongtown Market in St. Paul, Minn. PHOTO COURTESY OF TRAVEL CHANNEL

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Andrew Zimmern, host of "Bizarre Foods America," visits with chef Doug Flicker of the Piccolo Restaurant in Minneapolis. Flicker shows Zimmern how he combines different meats -- in this case partridge and duck -- using food glue to create hybrid meats. PHOTO COURTESY OF TRAVEL CHANNEL

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On the second episode of "Bizarre Foods America" host Andrew Zimmern travels to New Orleans where he tastes plenty of uncommon items including giant fried frog legs here. PHOTO COURTESY OF TRAVEL CHANNEL

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A local favorite in Minnesota is "hot dish," a farm-style cassarole that combines whatever meats, vegetables and sauces a cook might have around the house. Several on the show featured Spam and tater tots, but here Andrew Zimmern tries an elk and wild rice hot dish. PHOTO COURTESY OF TRAVEL CHANNEL

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Andrew Zimmern, host of "Bizarre Foods America" on the Travel Channel, checks out a table of ingredients on an upcoming episode. The series returns on Monday, Jan. 23, and includes one episode shot in Los Angeles, which will probably air in late summer. PHOTO COURTESY OF TRAVEL CHANNEL

Andrew Zimmern is the host of "Bizarre Foods America," a Travel Channel show that travels the United States to sample meals such as deep-fried snapping turtle and bitter bamboo soup to name but two of those that show up in the season premiere on Monday. PHOTO COURTESY OF TRAVEL CHANNEL

'Bizarre Foods America'

When: 10 p.m. Monday

Where: Travel Channel

For more: Travelchannel.com

Andrew Zimmerntakes a bite of a pig intestine prepared in the traditional way of the Hmong of Cambodia, chews and swallows and delivers his verdict.

“That is sublime,” says the chef and TV food personality. “This is just earthy, livery. A little bit poopy – in a good way.”

That latter bit, you should know, is not a particularly strange thing to hear Zimmern say. For five years now, he’s eaten foods that many Americans might not, tucking into meals around the world as host of the Travel Channel’s “Bizarre Foods.”

And while the show occasionally came home to spotlight unusual American cuisine, the fifth season that premieres on Monday stays entirely within the United States, taking viewers to cities such as Minneapolis, New Orleans, West Virginia and Los Angeles.

“I thought it was more interesting after five years on the road to take a look at the food in our country a little more in depth,” says Zimmern of the decision to do this season as “Bizarre Foods America.” “If our show is about making the unfamiliar familiar, wouldn’t it be interesting to see what’s going on literally in our own backyard?”

Zimmern knows that many viewers might not want to get familiar with some of the unusual foods on the show – in the season premiere there are dishes made with pig uteruses and duck testicles to mention just two – but he says that’s mostly a matter of how and where we were raised.

“We are all born adventurous eaters,” he says. “Pickiness is a learned behavior and is cultural and is the sin of the parents and the community. Little kids in Cambodia eat bats and tarantulas because to them it’s food and their parents don’t act aghast. And little kids in Australia pull long-necked turtles out of the ground and roast them in their shells.”

As a boy growing up in New York City, Zimmern says his parents encouraged him to try all kinds of foods, at home and on trips overseas. And his son, Noah, has been raised to try almost anything.

“When he was three we were in Mexico on the street eating tacos de cabeza (made from the meat of a cow’s head),” Zimmern says. “We were on our family holiday in the Caribbean and we have whole roasted pork and they grilled the kidneys and made sausage empanadas. And I think Noah had those almost every day at lunch.

“He eats everything, and the reason is our family never disparages it.”

There are, of course, things Zimmern eats in his travels that he doesn’t like.

“There’s a whole bunch,” he says. “I’m way more suspicious of fruit than I am of anything else. Four or five of the worst things I’ve put in my mouth have been fruits.”

But he’ll try almost anything.

“I’ve only refused two things in the history of the show, both of which were clearly a guaranteed trip to the hospital,” Zimmern says. “One was a dish (in India) that was seasoned with some obviously contaminated water – it was brown, sludgy water, and I passed on that.

“When I was in the Philippines once there was a whole bunch of rotted chicken carcasses and someone was grilling them and selling them. And he offered me a chicken intestine that was way past its time and not cooked all the way through.”

If you’ve not seen the show before, understand that while the food is often bizarre – at least by mainstream American culinary standards – Zimmern treats everything he eats with respect. Unlike the Dutch TV hosts who recently earned a huge amount of attention for claiming they had eaten little morsels of each others’ excised flesh, Zimmern says he’s not interested in sensationalism on his series.

“I’m interested in exploring foods from different cultures, and it’s an entertainment program, but there’s a serious aspect to it, too,” he says. “And when I see something fantastical like (the Dutch show) it immediately turns me off.”

Even so, Zimmern says that in theory he’s not entirely ruled out that most taboo of tastes.

“Sitting here now would I eat human flesh? No. If I was in Papua New Guinea, which we’ve tried to do several times, and if I was with one of those tribes that still practice cannibalism? I don’t know what I would do. Under what situation would I not? I think it’s a fascinating question. I don’t know the answer to it.”

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